THE FOLLOWING PAGE IS QUITE LENGTHY.
We recommend each user however take 5 minutes to read through and familarise themselves with the forum rule examples.
Thank you!
– The Dog Squad Staff
This forum operates based on Warning Points, and around 5 core rule types.
All examples given below are examples only and not the views of The Dog Squad or its staff. In addition all examples are given only to demonstrate the types of posts that might attract action, however individual rule interpretations are up to each staff member.
For information on the penalties these rules may incur please see the Warning Points page here:
This page covers the following rule breaches/core rule types:
- Personal attacks, direct user abuse, or backbiting (Personal Attack Rules).
- Trolling, flaming, or bait posting (Nuisance Behaviour Rule).
- Pointless/meaningless content (Nuisance Behaviour Rule).
- Harassing, bullying or hateful remarks (HBH Rule).
- Threats (creditable or otherwise) towards anyone (Major Rule Breach).
- Staff Abuse (Major Rule Breach).
- TOU/Privacy policy breaches (Major Rule Breach).
- Porn/nudity/sexually offensive/abhorrent materials (Major Rule Breach).
- Discussions of illegal activities (drugs, porn, piracy) (Content Rule Breach).
- Discussions on illegal live streaming discussion, or bypassing legitimate links (Content Rule Breach).
- Discussions on religion, terrorism, political, border disputes, and conspiracy theories (Content Rule Breach).
- Defaming comments (Content Rule Breach).
- Breach of sub-forum specific rule (Other Rule Breach).
PERSONAL ATTACKS, DIRECT USER ABUSE, OR BACKBITING
Personal Attacks
Any comment (be it in posts, threads, or private conversation) with the sole intention of attacking another user. This includes childish comments, and comments about a person’s race/gender/religion/sexual preference (used in a manner designed to offend/abuse).
EXAMPLES:
– “Shut Up Idiot!!”
– “Typical Muslims”
– “Indians are nothing but trouble”
– “Bloody Woman… stupid bitch”
– “Piss off faggot”
Abuse
Any direct attack on another user, using foul language, including in other languages.
EXAMPLES:
– “Piss off cunt”
– “Go Fuck Yourself”
Backbiting
Any response to another users post made in an aggressive manner. Rather than react to a users post you deem unacceptable, instead report the post and let a moderator deal with it.
EXAMPLES:
– “Shut your mouth dickhead”
– “Fuck You”
TROLLING, FLAMING, OR BAIT POSTING
Trolling
A thread/post specifically designed to incite widespread controversy, conflict, offence, or annoyance to other users.
The main goal of trolling is to trigger an emotional response from other posters in the form of:
- Personal Attacks
- Intolerance
- Backbiting
- Abuse
- Hateful Remarks / Emotional outbursts
Such posts/threads (and the response they generate) are disruptive, pointless, and create tension. Trolling often results in long running feuds and rifts between users, and puts excessive load onto staff to adjudicate such issues.
EXAMPLES:
– Creating a thread and deliberately misspelling player’s names.
– Creating a thread recommending a prop play fullback, or fullback play prop.
– Creating a thread with the intention to mislead/distort reality.
Trolling is considered nuisance behavior, and dealt with seriously.
Flaming
Deliberate comments (often untrue) made not to harass, bully, or troll, but rather to irritate another user into responding with a negative reaction. Whilst we understand a bit of friendly rivalry may occur between opposition members (including during games), there is a line between this flaming a user because of a team they choose to support. Flaming is often targeted, unwarranted, and out of nowhere.
EXAMPLE:
– (knowing that someone is a fan of Player1 who is playing well) “Player 1 is useless.. you must be the only one that likes them”.
– (knowing that someone supporters another team) “Sydney FC are fucking crap, as are Melbourne Victory… Wanderers FTW!”
Flaming is considered nuisance behavior, and dealt with seriously.
Bait Posting
Whilst often considered similar to trolling, bait posting is actually rather different. Any post made with the express intention to garner a desired reaction from a user. Bait posts are often seen as throwaway comments, made with no intention to reply in a suitable manner. Unlike Trolling and Flaming, Bait Posting is often targeted towards one or a few users.
EXAMPLES:
– Following around and quoting users posts, and/or replying with negative comments / personal attacks / abusive remarks that make absolutely no attempt to debate the users quoted comments or opinions.
– Creating a thread deliberately targeting a user (or group of users) to get a reaction from them.
Bait posting is considered nuisance behavior, and dealt with seriously.
POINTLESS/MEANINGLESS CONTENT
Content that is deemed to have no point or purpose, and contains no attempt to create a valid discussion, MAY be deemed pointless or meaningless. All threads should have a purpose or point, and be able to be discussed amongst users. Remember that a forum isn’t Facebook, so ensure your content has some way of being discussed or you may find it removed.
This includes (but is not limited to) content in other languages, content that is full of emoticons, or content that is basic and makes no attempt to create a topic that can be discussed.
Pointless, and meaningless content is considered nuisance behavior, and dealt with seriously.
HARASSING, BULLYING OR HATEFUL REMARKS
As a forum that is mental health aware, and with a strong commitment towards the betterment of others mental health, HBH (Harassment/Bullying/Hateful) breaches are treated as a very serious issue, and will be dealt with harshly (often with lengthy or lifetime bans).
Harassment
Any actions/posts/threads/comments made, with the intention or inference to annoy, discredit, or hassle another user.
EXAMPLE:
– Constant messages such as “You aren’t a real supporter, your a pest, your a parasite” directed towards a single user.
– Constantly following a user around the forums and responding with harassing comments.
Bullying
Belittling or targeted comments, designed to impact the mental health of another poster (by either a singular user post/thread/comment, or combining with other users on a bandwagon). Bullying has no place in society, or on this forum.
The Dog Squad takes bullying very seriously, and has ZERO tolerance towards any user found engaging in such content.
EXAMPLE:
– “Nobody likes you on here”
– “Your partner must be desperate to put up with you”
– “I’m pretty sure he’s retarded”
– “why don’t you do us all a favor and fuck off”
Hateful Remarks
Comments directed towards a user, player, or anyone else, designed to cause offence or shock. Such comments are disgusting, reprehensible, and have no place on the forum.
EXAMPLES:
– Wishing death/violence upon a player/person/user.
– Commenting that a person/player/user should commit suicide/kill themselves.
THREATS (CREDITABLE OR OTHERWISE) TOWARDS ANYONE
Under no circumstances will any user issue, infer, or indicate any creditable threat of violence or harm towards a user or staff member across ANY forum media (be it in a thread/post, chat, signature, avatar, or private conversation).
Under all Australian States it is a criminal offence to “use a carriage service to threaten, menace, or harass”. This includes online forums.
As such, users found engaging in such activity will face a lengthy ban or be removed from the forum, and law enforcement may be involved (should the other user involve choose to take the matter further).
The Dog Squad will comply with any lawful requests (be it from law enforcement or others) in the matter (subject to potential charges).
EXAMPLES:
– “You’re dead”
– “I’ll smash you”
– “I’ll get the boys on to you”
– “Watch your back next game”
– “Meet up tough guy, I’ll punch your face in”.
– “Let’s meet up so you can say it to my face”
TOU/PRIVACY POLICY BREACHES
Any rule breach pertaining to our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use documentation.
PORN/NUDITY/SEXUALLY OFFENSIVE/ABHORRENT MATERIALS
The posting of anything considered to be porn, nudity, sexually inappropriate/obscene, vulgar, sexually-abusive, or abhorrent are not to be posted (even as a joke).
The posting of such content will be considered a major rule breach.
Abhorrent and vulgar material may include shock sites/videos, gore, depictions of extreme violence, sexual violence, etc.
In addition to the above, any user that uploads either:
- A personal (or private) naked photograph/video that may be reasonably assumed to be of themselves ; and/or
- A personal (or private) naked photograph/video that may be reasonably assumed to be a case of revenge porn;
will have the matter reported to law enforcement on the groups of a potential revenge porn attack, and potentially exposing a minor to pornographic material (as we cannot confirm the age of all users is 18+).
DISCUSSIONS OF ILLEGAL ACTIVITIES (DRUGS, PORN, PIRACY)
Under no circumstances are illegal activities to be discussed or entered into on the forums. This includes:
- Discussion of any criminal action (that may result in a police charge).
- Discussion of illegal drugs (including manufacture and procurement).
- Discussion or posting of illegal pornography (as deemed illegal by current Australian legislation).
- Acts of cruelty towards animals.
- Discussion of illegal torrents.
- Discussion of illegal software, music, movies, TV Shows, and/or other media.
- Posting of any content that contains phishing, malware, spyware, viruses, or anything else that could be considered a cyber crime.
Posting of such content is a serious infringement that may result in the removal of your account or a lengthy ban.
Where required, The Dog Squad will comply with any lawful demands to identify users who post such content, whereby a criminal act may have been committed.
Where deemed necessary, The Dog Squad will engage law enforcement services depending on the nature of the content posted.
This is considered a medium rule breach, and action will depend entirely on the content posted.
DISCUSSIONS ON ILLEGAL LIVE STREAMING DISCUSSION, OR BYPASSING LEGITIMATE LINKS
The discussion of / linking to / alluding or inferring to live streaming links, or discussing/inferring how to illegally circumnavigate legitimate links outside Australia is strictly forbidden. This includes discussion of VPNs, Pay TV networks, and streaming providers like Hulu, Amazon Prime, and Netflix.
This is considered a medium rule breach, and action will depend entirely on the content posted.
DISCUSSIONS ON RELIGION, TERRORISM, POLITICAL, BORDER DISPUTES, AND CONSPIRACY THEORIES
The Dog Squad allows free discussion, however some topics are generally a one way street towards problems and arguments. As such any thread that focuses on the following (or goes off topic into the following) will be closed and deleted:
- Terrorism including individual events.
- Religion including individual events.
- Politics including individual events.
- Discussions relating to countries where the main topic of conversation relates to border disputes.
- Discussions that result in conspiracy theories. Keep it factual!
This list may be amended at any time.
Threads that are started on such topics may be deleted without notification. Posts that are made inside threads may be removed.
Staff will (where possible) show discretion towards keeping content unless it creates problems.
This is considered a medium rule breach, and action will depend entirely on the content posted.
DEFAMING COMMENTS
This is covered largely in Privacy Policy and Terms of Use documentation.
Comments made without lawful evidence from one person or another, which lowers or harms the reputation of an identifiable third person may be considered defamation.
If you are referring to an article, quote the appropriate article.
If you are referring to a social media post, please keep in mind that social media is full of rumors, and as such is not a reliable source.
Posts/threads that contain potentially defaming comments, made with social media as a source, will be removed (unless the social media account is verified as a true and legitimate account from a media personality).
Moderators will generally act quickly to remove such content.
By being a registered member you agree that The Dog Squad is in no way legally responsible for the content of your posts. Should your comments be legally challenged, The Dog Squad will comply with all lawful and legal requirements (including but not limited to law enforcement).
This is considered a medium rule breach, and action will depend entirely on the content posted.
BREACHES OF SUB-FORUM SPECIFIC RULE
There may be other forum specific rules stickied at the top of sub-forums.
Depending on the rule broken as to the infringement that may follow.